VIEW

VIEW; Asian 'It' Girls Say So Long to the Dragon Lady

Published: May 21, 2000

(Page 2 of 2)

I nodded vigorously in agreement, remembering the time a classmate of my younger sister's came over after school, smelled rice cooking and asked if we had pet gerbils. My sister explained the odor by saying that our heating system was broken.

It wasn't always clear, growing up in Albuquerque, how to bridge the divide between my Chinese heritage and my desire to fit in with the tall, tanned set at the tennis club. My parents, a scientist and a classical pianist, spoke Cantonese to each other, and to us, when we were small. In our house, high style was my grandmother wearing a cheongsam and singing Chinese opera as we kids padded around the house in our embroidered Chinese pajamas with frog buttons.

But away from home, being Asian could be nerve-racking. My white and Hispanic classmates flattened their noses with their fingers to mock my wide features. When we had to line up by height, I was always shortest and last. My beauty ideals were the blond models in Seventeen and in the ads for Ocean Pacific, the Southern California clothing company. When Madonna hit the charts, I wore crucifixes, black lace gloves and rubber bracelets up to my elbows. My New Wave phase followed: head shaved on the sides, dyed orange hair forced skyward with gel and diluted glue.

If only I had had a role model like Margaret Yang, the quirky high school girl in last year's film ''Rushmore'' who played rock guitar, acted in avant-garde school plays and got the boy in the end. Why the sudden embrace of Asian women and culture?

The designer Vivienne Tam, who was raised in Hong Kong (and whose style guide ''China Chic'' will be published in September by ReganBooks), links it to the new global economy and the opening up of Asia. ''When Hong Kong went back to China in 1997, I think there was more awareness around the world of Asian culture,'' she said on the phone from her Seventh Avenue office. ''And then Prada and Miu Miu started the whole chinoiserie trend.''

Phoebe Eng, the author of ''Warrior Lessons: An Asian American Woman's Journey Into Power'' (Pocket Books), said it's not the rest of the world but Asian women themselves who have changed. ''We are the crop of daughters who finally had choices,'' Ms. Eng, 37, said. ''We didn't have the same sense of duty and boundness of our mothers, so we took our own paths and went into acting, comedy and entertainment. The number of Asian women entering F.I.T. and Parsons is amazing.''

Ms. Eng also pointed out that Asians are not only fashion forward, but also have an ethnicity that is integral to their style. ''You see lots of 15-year-olds wearing Hello Kitty and chinoiserie,'' she said. ''And older Asian women have an androgynous look, and that is what makes the look sensuous. We used to think of Asian models as chiseled and Eurasian-looking. Now, some have very small eyes, and others have square jaws. Anything goes.''

It didn't occur to me that my ethnic looks could be a style advantage when I took my first job after college, as an editorial assistant at a beauty magazine. Once again I was surrounded by lithe blondes, now with expensive haircuts and dressed in black. But it turned out to be a propitious time. One of my first writing assignments was a story about ''universal beauty'' and featured Irina Pantaeva, a Siberian model with northern Chinese features. Doling out advice on how to beautify the flat lids and sparse lashes of an Asian eye, I began to feel more in control of my looks and less concerned about fitting in.

Then something unexpected happened. I found myself part of an Asian style clique, a bunch of trend-happy editors and writers who introduced me not only to sample sales, but also to the soup dumplings at Joe's Shanghai in Chinatown. We often meet there after work, shove our Lambertson Truex totes under our chairs and order (mostly in Mandarin) greasy noodles and ''lion's head,'' giant, gelatinous meatballs drenched in brown sauce and surrounded by a mane of greens, which we share, pecking at the communal platters with our chopsticks. In between bites of noodles and media gossip, I can rant freely about my family and my boyfriend, then gloat over the three $25 string bikinis I just bought from Old Navy, the store Lisa Ling represents on television.

Photos: Lisa Ling has emerged as a style icon, selling clothes, and charm, on a television commercial for Old Navy. (Old Navy); Tsai Chin as Ling, a stereotypical Chinese sex nymph, and Sean Connery in ''You Only Live Twice,'' in 1967. (Photofest)(pg. 1); Michelle Yeoh delivers a round kick to a villain in ''Supercop.'' She will portray a kickboxing police officer in the film version of ''Charlie's Angels'' in November. (Photofest); Lucy Liu, nominated for best supporting actress, at Emmy ceremonies last year. (Associated Press); CoCo Lee, a singer from Hong Kong who was reared in San Francisco, released ''Just No Other Way,'' her first album in the United States, two months ago. (Torkil Gudnason/Sony)(pg. 4)